Odd Color Phenotype?

[houston]

So! My first meat mutt litter was a Red New Zealand buck to a Champagne D'Argent doe, and most of the kits look like a typical Champ- black with silvering. However, I had three who look almost like wild type rabbits.

I'm just wondering where the agouti (?) came in, and what color they officially are.

 

[Dood]

NZRed are agouti based (A_ B_ C_ D_ ee) so that is where it came from and this colour is call chestnut = (A_ B_ D_ E_)

If the buck had black kits then he must carry the self gene (= Aa B_ C_ D_ ee ) but there is a possibility they "black" kits are actually gold tipped steel (= A_ B_ C_ D_ Es e) as the steel gene is quite common in self based meat breeds and the mother could carry it (aa B_ C_ D_ Es_)

 

[akane]

Champagne's don't generally carry a steel gene but it could happen. Depends if someone didn't want to put in the effort to get purer stock at some point. Then you get funny mixes. Champagne may carry chocolate or nonextension-e because creme d'argent is red with silver, and argent brun is chocolate with silver. There is a blue and a chestnut (the color of those rabbits with silver) recognized in other countries but uncommon here and at least the chestnut version cannot be shown under anything. The crossing of champagne, brun, and creme can get you some odd tort colors and more red/creme colors when crossed to something like red. Most argente crosses silver quite a bit by maturity but again it depends what someone put into the line because if it's diluted somewhere the silver can be greatly reduced or just plain disappear. Silver is not a simple gene.